Sox Face Texas In Rubber Match This Afternoon

Before embarking on a 10-game, 3-city road trip, the Red Sox will face off against the Texas Rangers today at 1:35PM in the rubber match of their three-game set. After pummeling supposed phenom Yu Darvish on Monday, old-timer Ryan Dempster put the clamps on everyone except Will Middlebrooks in a 6-3 loss on Tuesday. Texas will send lefty Matt Harrison to the mound—who has given up two earned runs or less in 8 of his last 10 starts. Josh Beckett, who missed is last start, will go for Boston.

If the Carmine Hose retain any hope of chasing a one-game playoff Fake Wild Card spot, they had better take this series finale. If they can embark on the road at an even .500, they can actually feel optimistic about the upcoming  trip—since they're actually a winning team on the road (26-23). They start with four games against a collapsing Indians ballclub, then head to Camden to meet the over-achieving Os' (just 4.5 games back of the Evil Ones). Speaking of the Pinstriped Posers, Boston finishes off the trip with three at The Concrete Bunker On 134th Street. Realistically, if the entire line-up is in place for most of the trip—and they get the decent starting pitching they've gotten recently—they could come back home on August 21st with a 64-58 record and actually be interesting for the last six weeks of the season. Could is the operative word.